ONE of the leading Scots actors of his generation, Duncan Macrae was also a strong advocate for Scottish independence​ and the Scots language.

Now a new play about Macrae, who insisted on staying in Scotland to ­establish his career, is to premiere on Saturday in Edinburgh.

Written and performed by Michael Daviot, it tells how the young Macrae would regularly take to a soap box on Glasgow Green in an attempt to ­persuade listeners about the virtues of Scottish independence.

He was born in Maryhill to Gaelic-speaking parents from Assynt but much of his career was devoted to plays in braid Scots which sold out to packed theatres.

“He was very vehement about ­doing work in Scotland in Scots for a ­Scottish audience,” said Daviot.

However, when Macrae first began acting, there was no real professional Scottish drama in Scotland so he spent the first 20 years of his acting career as an amateur while making a living as a teacher.

“At that time the only professional theatre seen in Scotland was really just visiting English companies,” said Daviot.

“Macrae could not work as a professional actor in Scotland – you had to go to London or work for an English repertory company.

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“At one point, he did go to London to understudy for Alastair Sim but he then thought ‘sod this I am staying put until there is a Scottish company I can work for’.”

Macrae finally became a ­professional actor when he became a co-founder of the Citizens Theatre in Glasgow in 1943, but by that time he had already made his name as an amateur actor playing Jamie the Saxt in the famous Robert McLellan play in 1937.

“That was his first big hit and it was hugely popular,” said Daviot.

“It was really part of the Scottish ­literary renaissance which included Hugh ­MacDiarmid. The likes of McLellan, Alexander Reid and Robert Kemp ­began to write plays in braid Scots and it was the beginning of a big boom in braid Scots theatre.”

As well as passionately believing in Scottish culture and that it should be accessible to everyone, Macrae was an advocate of the Edinburgh ­Festival Fringe.

“Even very early on, the Festival was accused of being a snobby thing and Macrae was not into that,” said ­Daviot. “He wanted to make the ­Festival and Fringe truly popular.”

He also believed in trade unions and co-founded Scottish Equity.

As Macrae’s fame grew, he branched out and worked on a number of films such as Tunes Of Glory with John Mills and Alec Guinness, while also recording popular Scottish songs like The Wee Cock Sparra which can still be seen on YouTube.

“That was really popularised by him and it took off like a rocket to the point where he got sick of it because it overshadowed everything else,” said Daviot.

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Completely unpretentious, ­Macrae acted alongside Laurence Olivier in Rhinoceros but also played the dame in Glasgow panto for around a ­decade.

“He was totally unashamed of ­variety theatre. He was snobbery-free which is one of the things I love about him,” said Daviot.

Macrae died in March 1967 in Glasgow before the release of ­several screen appearances in the films ­Casino Royale and 30 Is A Dangerous Age, Cynthia and in the television series The Wednesday Play and The Prisoner.

“One of the interesting things about him is that on film he was ­really strong and commanding, ­almost intimidating, but on stage, he often played the daft laddie,” Daviot said. “If people remember him at all, I don’t think they know the scope of his career.”

He believes that had Macrae lived beyond the age of 61, he would have had a bigger international career as he was becoming more well known outside Scotland.

Daviot would now like to see some of the Scots plays that ­Macrae ­championed being revived as he ­believes there is not enough work in the Scottish tongue on stage.

“I saw these braid Scots plays in the King’s Theatre in Edinburgh and it was crammed,” he said.

“It was filled with people from every single level of society and that just doesn’t happen any more.

“A few people need to be brave and put on some stuff in Scots and see how it goes. We are losing a whole strand of our culture and I strongly believe that if we lived in any other country people would be noticing and doing something about it.”

A Noble Clown is being staged as part of a celebration of Scottish theatre history this weekend at the Scottish Storytelling Centre.

It will be performed on ­Saturday and Sunday, accompanied by a pre-curtain talk with Priscilla ­Barlow, ­author of Macrae’s ­biography Wise Enough To Play The Fool, ­speaking about Scotland’s ­theatre scene during Macrae’s lifetime.